The US and UK patent offices have agreed to share and recognise each other's patent examination reports under a new deal. The offices hope the deal could save significant application time for would-be patent holders.
The 12-month pilot deal creates what the offices are calling a Patent Prosecution Highway. It means that someone …

re: Oh Crap

I'm sorry, but the UK will never be the 51st State of the U.S. That "honor" belongs to Iraq. You and Australia may battle it out to see who gets to be the 52nd State and who gets to be the 53rd State.

The broken nature of our patent system is seriously disturbing, especially when you consider it's sole objective is to promote innovation. Well, I guess it has promoted innovation in a manner of speaker. Innovation of courtroom antics should count as innovation, just not good innovation.

Personally, I think all patents should have to go through a committee (not a single "examiner" [or even a few]), wherein that committee is made up of people in the industry the patent is sought for. So if it's an IT-related patent, it should have to pass through an IT committee. If it's a medical-related patent, it should have to pass through a medical committee. If it's a machining-related patent, it should have to pass through a machinist committee. That's the only way to pass the "obvious" test. Because something obvious to someone skilled in an industry will be complete gibberish to someone not in that industry. Which, I think, is the cause of so many bogus patents.

PPH:

Bah every one knows

If I'm not mistaken

The last thing we need is faster patent processing. Bring in the speed bumps, the donkey carts and the perpetually nagging old hag to slow it all down and make sure a patent is actually worth the paper it's written on !